Cultivating an Enchanted Intellect with Andrew Morton of Worldview Academy

My favorite encapsulation of, I guess, of all this, I stole from a student, we were reading

the ethics of Elfland, and I had them do reflections. And here's what he said. This was his,

their challenge was to try to encapsulate in one sentence, okay, the chief take away from the text.

And his answer was, the most reasonable response to reality is wonder at the magic and gratitude toward

the magician. Anchored is a production of the classic learning test, based in the Napolis,

Maryland, reconnecting knowledge and virtue through meaningful assessments. Visit us at CLTXAM.com

slash get started. Welcome back to the Anchored podcast, the official podcast of the classic

learning test. My name is Soren Schwab, VP of partnerships here at CLT, and today we're joined by

Andrew Morton. Andrew Morton is a senior fellow at World View Academy. Andrew's relationship

with World View began in 2002 when his life was changed at camp. He attended World View Academy

several times in the early 2000s and served as college staff for several years starting in

I know four. Having earned a BA in philosophy from one of my favorite colleges, Grove City College,

Andrew is passionate about teaching Christians in all seasons of life, how to integrate the life

of their mind with that of their faith. For over a decade, he has been an educational ministry

as a part of the classical Christian education renewal as both a teacher and administrator.

He has taught logic, philosophy, apologetics, history, integrated humanities, and mathematics,

pioneered leadership discipleship programs in the 7th through 12th grade and trained besting class

teachers. His wife Elizabeth and his two children William and Claire joyfully spent their summers

traveling with Andrew as he teaches with World View Academy and friends were in for a treat. I'm

so excited to have Andrew on the podcast today. Welcome. Thank you so much, Soren. It is such a joy

to be here. Yeah, I was really looking forward to the recording here and I'm excited for our audience

to learn more about World View Academy. Before we get into that, as we always do in the Anchored

Podcast, we'd love to hear about your own kind of educational journey. Talk to us a little

bit about your K-12 formation and of course how you got to Grove City. Absolutely. It's a good story,

but I will keep it short and sweet. Net out, I was homeschooled. When my mother, she loved to say

I was homeschooling before homeschooling was cool. Back in the 80s. That was a real thing. If we

went to the grocery store on a weekday, there was some concern. If I had been out running through

the woods and had some bruises and cuts from the brambles or whatever, it's like, man,

somebody going to call child services on us. I'm the youngest three and my mother homeschooled

all three. Back in that era, the classical Christian renewal, as we know, it was just kind of

getting started. If you were a believer who held the conviction that the public school system

was not an option for your kids, you really had very few options. My mother made the choice

to sacrificially teach us all at home. I did that. My 10th technically, so when you're homeschooled,

this is kind of a funny anecdote. If you ask homeschoolers what grade they're in, I think

come in and I kind of love that. There is a beauty to that. But roughly around my sophomore

junior year, I went to, I did the dual enrolled thing, went to the junior college, great experience

both in terms of still a good education at the junior college level at the time. But also

very formative in that I encountered a lot of resistance to my faith and got to put into practice

things that I had been learning a World View Academy. Another big piece of my formation would be

13, 14 and 15. I did indeed attend World View Academy as a student, which had a profound effect

on my life, which I'm sure we'll get into more later. But yeah, so I dual enrolled. My thinking was,

this is going to be great. I'm going to knock out my gen eds. Then I can transfer as a junior and

just knock out my last two years. Well, I learned one of our longstanding partners is Grove City College.

World View, Grove City have a lovely relationship. I learned about Grove City from a full page ad in

our student notebook at camp. Wow. Yep. And so I applied, little plug-a-plug-plug here for Grove City.

I applied to, I mean, I knew my experience at World View had convicted me. Educational ministry

was for me. I was supposed to go on. I was supposed to continue learning. Maybe write, who knows?

Teach on the collegiate level was my initial dream. I was going to be professor Morton.

And I knew I wanted to do that. So I applied to the kind of the schools that you would think,

Wheaton and Biola and Grove City. In the end, what I learned was Grove City offered, you know,

a wonderful, wonderful classical educational program for less than half the cost of everybody else.

So I was able to work a pizza delivery job and pay cash for college, which was amazing.

And it's still the case that Grove City is the best value out there. So again,

without accepting a dollar from the federal government. And that's exactly it, right?

Maybe there's a connection between those two things. So yeah, I went to Grove City and then

alas, all of my hard earned credits, they only accepted as electives. So I crammed a four-year degree

into five years as one is want. And I majored in philosophy. That was my way of cheating. I wanted

to study everything. And so philosophy is kind of, you get to do that. As the, you know, secondary

discipline that undergirds all disciplines, it's kind of a way of cheating.

Minered in history, interdisciplinary classics and theology, I was one credit away from getting

my history minor, but I decided to get married and move on with life. So that's that. I've been

very slowly, very, very slowly, emphasis on slowly, working on a master's degree through

Southern evangelical seminary in philosophy. But yeah, that's kind of my formal educational journey.

We're at intersex with the classical renewals, another kind of story altogether.

Yeah, well, let's, I guess, you know, when I'm listening to this, it's clear that the love of

learning and, you know, and pursuit of knowledge was kind of instilled to you, you know, from,

from early on. And it seems like growth city just kind of complemented that, that's so well.

I got, I am curious because you talked about, you know, that was really at the, I mean, year,

your mother was a trailblazer, right? When it comes, comes to kind of a specialty class at

the homeschooling, did, were you aware of that word, classical education? I mean, was that something

that you used or was it just something you received and later on, like, oh, that's what that refers

to now. It was very much the latter. You know, the classical was not in vogue. I mean, at the time,

if you went to a homeschool convention, what, what, what passed for homeschool convention in that era,

you know, you had a Becca, you had school of tomorrow, you know, Bob Jones. Bob Jones, you know,

now you go, you go to homeschool convention, you're overwhelmed by the resources. It's a totally

different ballgame. But no, the classical concept, it was there kind of unconsciously, but I don't

think my mother ever thought to herself, I'm going to teach my kids classically. It kind of happened

by accident through reading great books. Two things happened that really steered me in that direction.

I found my brother's copy of The Chronicles of Narnia. I think I was 11 at the time, 10 or 11.

My parents were by and large unaware of Lewis and Tolkien. There was a copy of The Hobbit

on my mom's shelf, but that's because it was on a, you know, a suggested curriculum list.

I picked up The Chronicles of Narnia and consumed those in three days. And then I picked up The Hobbit

and read that. And then I said, Mom, I really need this Lord of the Rings thing. And I read that.

And that immersive me on this journey into the Inklings world, which is a classical world.

So that happened. I fell in love with CS Lewis, Tolkien, George McDonald, at all.

And then I went to World View Academy, which I didn't understand this at the time. You know,

those of us in the classical Christian renewal know what's happening to those students in the

classroom. A lot of the time they're unaware of what's being done to them. I was unaware of what

was being done to me at World View Academy. So it's only retrospectively I can look back and go,

oh, I see how these things connect. But World View was a very classical experience. And the teachers

were by and large classical educators. And so of course, that came through. So those two things,

I guess you could say, you know, Lewis talks about how his bad, his imagination was baptized by

George McDonald. And his intellect was baptized by GK Chesterton. Well, my intellect was

baptized. And my imagination was baptized by World View Academy. And then CS Lewis, and Tolkien,

and George McDonald. So that is so neat. That is so neat to hear. And good on your mom to

still buy the hobbit, even though, indeed, you know, the imprinted head on, indeed. I'll never,

I'll never forget. I feel so sad for, you know, this great generation of students because

as I tell them, you'll never really experience what going to a great movie in theaters is like.

And you will never experience when the Lord of the Rings came out in theaters for the first time,

which was a quite the incredible cultural moment. Oh my god, I was still living in Germany. And

I remember I did the three in a row. Yes, you know, I mean, it was, it was something else. But,

I mean, I got, Andrew, so many students will never know what it feels like to read a whole book.

Right. I mean, you know, I mean, it's, it's, it's, it's, uh, and just listening to you and, and,

and describe that, that experience of what it did to your imagination, your moral imagination.

You rarely ever hear people, oh my god, I just fell in love with reading when I read this like

informational text or this man, right? I mean, you know, and yet that's kind of what we're now

giving to our students in high school, right? They don't read full novels anymore. And

and then we are so surprised that they don't become readers, you know, no, I couldn't agree more,

which, you know, part of that, you know, we're, we talk about the enchanted mind, the enchanted

intellect or an enchanted worldview. I mean, very obviously a part of my formation was, it wasn't,

I mean, yes, I, when I discovered the Chronicles that led me in later years to

my Christianity and the abolition of man until we have faces in the great divorce and, you know,

that, you know, I started reading, you know, everybody that Lewis read and, you know, so yes,

I did end up in the, in the, in the deeper theological waters, but my imagination was formed

primarily by fiction. Um, I have become a huge advocate. Um, and every chance I get, I encourage

fathers, especially, and mothers read great fiction to your kids, and especially, please, um,

there's kind of a unique, and I can understand and have a lot of sympathy for the impetus behind

this. There's kind of a unique, um, within the Christian evangelical world, there's a subculture

that's still very like magic and fantasy and all that is very scary and, um, and unfortunately,

that has led to some confusion about, you know, what Tolkien and Lewis were doing with their works,

or George McDonald, um, and how, um, when you engage with great fiction like that, great fantasy

fiction, um, it actually reinforces what is real. It's not escapism. Um, and I, I can, I would venture

to say, I can put percentages on it, but I, I talk about mere Christianity and I teach out of

texts like the weight of glory, but man, it, it was arrogant that shaped me, right? Um, it was

Prince Caspian that shaped me. Um, and yeah, you're absolutely right, Soren. Um, if we want students

to love reading, we have to give them things that are worth loving. Um, and you, you don't hand

somebody, uh, Calvin's institutes first, right? Um, that's not where we start, but any who, um,

please, yeah, that's, let's not, let's not do that. Um, well, I would love to hear kind of that,

that's true. I mean, I love, you know, when, when you have folks that, you know, work for an

organization and then they themselves were so impacted by it back in the days, right? So, uh, talk to us,

talk to us about that first, um, how did you, how did you, or your mom, I suppose, uh, first

hear about World View Academy? What was that first experience like? And then maybe just give a

brief for our audience that is not familiar with it, like what is World View Academy? Those camps.

Absolutely. In my favorite topic. So I'll try to, I'll try to limit the, you know, the timeline.

Um, so I, um, I first went when I was 13 and, uh, World View Academy started in 1996. The,

the four founders of World View looked around and realized, man, there, there is a, there is a,

there's a gap here. Um, there, there, there is a vacuum. Um, we are not, I mean, Charles Malik,

many, many years ago pointed out that, uh, we are effective at spiritually converting people,

but very ineffective at intellectually converting people. Um, and so, uh, what, what they recognize

was there was a need, um, for training, a need for real training and not just training in a

transference of information, um, but in, in true formation. Um, so they, they were founded in 96.

Um, it's a, it's the form of the ministry is primarily that of a, it's a leadership camp. It's

a summer leadership camp experience, but it's, it's unlike any leadership camp I guarantee you,

it's unlike any leadership camp you have been to. Um, the best analogy I can come up with is

attending World View. It's a, it's a Sunday through a Friday. There are 25 hours of class time,

but that is not information transfer time. That is, uh, formative, engaging, interactive experiences.

You can actually get up to two credit hours of college credit through Corbin University for going

to World View Academy. Um, another one of our ministry partners. Um, but it's like stepping into

a apprenticeship or a, um, like a, like an internship, right? When you get an internship

in some career path, you get to go and kind of taste what it's like to do that job.

You get a sense of what the daily work is. You get a sense of what the payoff is. Whether this

is meaningful or not, and, and that'll tell you, should I continue down this career path or not?

All analogies break down over time, but the best analogy I can give you is going to World View Academy

for that week is like an internship and what it's like to live a life that is fully sold out to

Jesus Christ. Uh, every part of the camp experience is designed intentionally to capture, right? We're

not, we're not merely homo sapiens, right? Um, we are also homo adorans and we are homo

volins, right? So we are, we are thinking, adoring, and willing creatures. And so formation has to

affect all of those true formation. Um, so every part of the camp experience is designed to

impact not just your mind to think biblically, but your heart to feel biblically and your will

to, to act biblically. For instance, one of the first things students learn at the beginning of camp

is how to engage in personal devotions in God's word. There are no phones at camp, okay?

Get those out of the way. Um, uh, we have a great communication system where parents can get a

whole of our staff and if students need to talk to mom and dad, it's arranged, but get those

distractions out of the way. Bring a Bible, right? Um, and then they are given tools for doing

personal quiet times. We call it a quiet time. And at the beginning of camp, they're given some

tools and some models for how to do that. And then every day it's built into the schedule,

the students get up at the same time and they have their quiet time. They start their day in God's

word and personal pursuit of Christ in his word. Um, and that's every single day. Um, another

example of this kind of marriage of heart will, um, obviously, you know, we're going to be talking

about what it means to be enchanted. Um, but as homo adorans is adoring, right? We know here in

the classical world, um, there are terms that get thrown around, um, concepts get thrown around.

One of those, right? I thought we'd already used the phrase information transfer, right? That's

a, that's a big bug of a, we don't want information transfer, uh, or mere information transfer. Um,

and that's because we, we realize what we love is more impactful than what we merely think.

So the, the experience at camp is not merely designed to give good information. It's to help the

student love it. Um, there's this wonderful passage in mere Christianity. I'll read it to you

because otherwise I'll butcher it. Um, where Lewis makes this point, he says, God cannot give us

happiness and peace apart from himself because it's not there. There is no such thing. Um,

and then to connect that with a passage, um, from Spurgeon to know him is to love him.

Um, so we want students to taste that, to learn what it is to drink from the found

that is the only found of true joy, to live it out. Um, and for that to have lasting

impact on their lives beyond camp. Um, last example, and then, um, I'll let you take the conversation

where you want, but, uh, we train students in evangelism methods. So our four pillars,

our worldviews, so students will learn and get trained in, um, how to think about other worldviews,

and they receive mere Christianity-esque training and Christian theology. What are the basics of

the Christian faith that all faith traditions can agree on, right? The authority of scripture,

the deity of Christ, um, apologetics, how to defend Christian truth claims, um, in a hostile world.

That part of the program is constantly being updated to, you know, deal with the current,

um, you know, what, what is the current and invogue threats to the Christian world from an

intellectual standpoint, and then evangelism. Um, this is not about becoming, you know,

patting each other on the back and going, boy, what good smart Christians we are and how many,

how many things we know that other people don't know. It's, we want students to leave camp,

brokenhearted. There are people who don't know Jesus because they now have tasted, um,

what it is to know in love and pursue after Jesus. So every Wednesday, so we train them,

Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and then a Wednesday. It's, it's a logistical nightmare, um, but we do it,

right? It is so worth it. It is one of those things that makes worldview so unique. We stick all those

kids on a bus. We take them to a, uh, secular campus of some kind and they share their faith with

strangers. Every summer, people come to Christ. Every summer, these kids go out and they,

they talk to an atheist. Oh, wow, they really do believe what those guys say they believe. They

talk to Hindus, they talk to, um, Muslims, um, Satanists, right? You name it. And then they come

back together after that, we call it the evangelism practicum and they all share their stories. So

they get to benefit from each other's experiences. But by the time camp is over, these students have

spent a week pursuing Christ with the first fruits of their time every day. They have learned that

the life of their mind and the life of their faith are actually one and the same. Um, they have

learned that the Christian worldview is not merely one of the options out there. It's the foundation

of all reality and insofar as any other worldview makes sense, it's stealing from our worldview to

build its own. And then they learn that we, we have been given a charge. Uh, the not-so-subtle

suggestion is one of my friends calls it the great commission. Go out making disciples. Um,

they have a heart for the lost and they have done it. They have done the scariest thing.

They have shared their faith with a stranger and they live to tell the tale.

The impact of that is just, it's incredible. Um, man, I love to be a fly on the wall, especially

kind of the debrief. Do it, you know, when they share, when they share those, you are, you are

welcome to come. Let us know you're coming and we'll share a meal with you and you can sit

on some sessions. So it would be fantastic. Well, tell me about, uh, I mean, this was, this was

incredible. Uh, thanks for, thanks for sharing that. Uh, let's, let's talk about some of the practical.

How old are the students? Is it, is it, is it target towards high school students in middle school,

what's kind of the age group and then, uh, locations? Is, is there one worldview academy with one,

you know, or, or is it all over the country? Got it. What about that? Absolutely. So target

ages are 13 to 18. Okay. It really is geared toward those formative, you know, middle and high

school years. Um, so, you know, there's such a malleability there. Um, and, and it's so critical

that they get a taste of the, of the real deal, um, in that time frame. Um, there are multiple camps

all over the country. So the ministry is based out of Texas. Um, but we have two teams of teaching

faculty and college staff. Um, the college staffers, I mean, these are, we, we love to say we have

the best college staff in the world. It's so true. Um, the college staffers come from all over

the country. They're responsible for helping the students, um, uh, kind of debrief, apply and

understand the content that's happening in the class and then personally leading them by example

throughout the week. And there's two different teams, one roughly east coast and one roughly

west coast. So there are total, if I remember correctly, 16 camps at different college campuses

during the summer. And then there's fall camps hosted in Texas. Um, so if you go to our website

worldview.org, there's a map that'll show you the nearest camp to you. Um, and, um, and the cost

and everything else associated with it, um, which depends on the campus, um, uh, where we're,

where we're hosted. Um, I would venture to say, um, yeah, up up there in your neck of the woods,

we got a camp in New Hampshire, we've got a camp in Virginia, we got camps in Pennsylvania. So

kind of all around you, we need a camp in Maryland though. So, um, there we go. There we go,

soren, uh, mission mission, uh, your mission, should you choose to accept it?

Incredible, incredible. And it will, of course, link, uh, uh, in the show notes and make sure we

get the, the website on there and more information for, for our audience. Uh, well, Andrew, you

mentioned, uh, the, the term enchanted intellect before. And, and earlier, what, what, um, resonated

with me, you mentioned kind of the formation, sometimes the formation of the, uh, the spiritual,

without the intellectual or vice versa, right? And we can probably all think of examples,

even maybe our own K-12 education, where maybe the one was a bit more than the other. Um,

what, what is that concept of the enchanted intellect? Uh, and, and how is it? Uh, yeah, how,

how do you guys think about it? Um, would love to hear more? Sure. Absolutely. Um, you know,

so this is, I, I'm gonna have to read you again. Um, so my journey in this terminology, I'm sure

somebody else out there has, has already written on the topic and, um, you know, we'll,

we'll be able to articulate this way better than I can. Um, but I was reading in, um, preface to

paradise lost. Um, and in that, Lewis makes a dedication to Charles Williams. And there was this

curious phrase that stuck with me for years. And as I was, um, so I, I guess a very short

biography about my connection with the classical world, um, graduate, grocery, I'm married,

working in software, knowing I want to get into the educational world. Um, one of my old mentors

from worldview says you need to get on the ACCS website and apply, find a job, start teaching.

So I did that, landed a job in Concord, North Carolina, and, uh, loved it, fell in love with the

whole movement. I actually, um, I called up the, the nearest school to me at the time, which was

Whitfield Academy in Kansas City. And I apprenticed myself to them. I just said, hey, I want to get into

this. I'm reading Doug Wilson's book, uh, you know, I was handed Martianna's capella. Um,

that's a bit over my head, but, you know, I'm intrigued. Help me. Um, I just want to come and learn

what you guys do. I'll volunteer my time, seven classes for free. And, uh, they graciously invited

me in and I got to sit for a year working with some other teachers and just observing. Um,

but in that time, um, I was reading this, uh, preface to paradise lost, uh, and when I came

and I had my own classroom, this stuck with me. I could not get it out of my head. So he's writing

to Charles Williams. And he says it's, uh, but it is a reasonable hope that of those who heard you

in Oxford, many will understand henceforth that when the old poets made some virtue their theme,

they were not teaching, but adoring and that what we take for the didactic is often the enchanted.

Okay, so I read this and the preface to paradise lost is wonderful, but of all the things I read in it,

the preface, uh, the dedication to Williams sticks with me. What is that, you know, what does that

mean? To be so enchanted that, um, a student could be sitting in your classroom going,

this guy must have spent a hundred hours crafting this lesson and practicing what he's saying

and, and, and the theatrics of it all. Wow. I mean, that's incredible. But no, no, what happened was

that that person came into the room and they were so in love with what they were communicating.

Um, uh, and that they had to communicate it to students that they loved. That's a, uh,

a wonderful definition of education, right? It's loving your subject with students that you love.

And so that really resonated with me. What does it mean to be an enchanted teacher?

And I think there's a, there's a great deal about this that is intuitive. Um, I mentioned,

uh, we don't want to produce merely, uh, intellectually converted people. Uh, we don't want

merely spiritually converted people. We want the whole person, right? The classical, um, Christian

educational enterprise is the formation of a true human being. Um, that's why we call them the

liberal arts. Because when a student, a young person engages within masters, these arts,

it frees them to become, uh, what they were meant to be, right? Their tell us, um, that for which

they were aimed and made. And so, uh, you know, I, uh, I wanted to capture, I wanted to capture

hearts and not merely minds. Asius Lewis says, we don't want merely clever devils. And so I became

convicted that that was a discipline I had to inhabit. There are days when I show up at the

classroom. Um, and I, I'm not feeling it. Um, and it required a discipline for me to remember,

no, these things that I'm teaching are great and beautiful. Um, and this is when I said a lot of

it's intuitive, we know that there are things in life that are caught, not taught. Uh, you have to

be contagious, right? You have to possess the contagion of enchantment. If you want your students

to catch it from you. And so first and foremost, um, the way I think about it, the way we think

about it at world view, the way, um, you know, in my classroom, I thought about it. If I'm not

enchanted with what my, I'm teaching my children, uh, and what I'm teaching my students, um, then I,

I'm teaching them to be disenchanted, right? I'm teaching them to be disenchanted with this.

Um, so there's a lot of ways we can go with that. Um, at world view, what that looks like

practically is, um, you know, the, I said, it's kind of like an internship or an apprenticeship.

Um, they, uh, they are going to sit in classrooms with faculty who are so in love with what

they're teaching that they dedicate their summers to travel around the country and do this without

pay every summer. Um, and with a group of college staffers that could be off at an internship,

but who love what, what this ministry is doing so much that they devote their summers to it.

Authentic, um, followers of Christ, there's not a mercenary in the crowd who love Jesus with

their heart, mind, soul and strength. Um, so that's one part of it. Um, the enchantment piece,

you can go into a lot of different directions. Um, you know, you and I could probably have a whole

conversation just unpacking a GK Chesterton and the ethics of Elfland. I mean, that, um,

so if you, if you want to, so very briefly for those who plug, even if we don't get into it,

if I do nothing today, but inspire, uh, your listeners to go read more Lewis Chesterton and Tolkien

than boom, uh, successful. Um, hopefully you'll also, um, look into World of the Academy. We would

love to love on your students. Um, but Chesterton wrote this beautiful essay inside the book orthodoxy

called The Ethics of Elfland. Um, and, uh, this is where we get into the whole modernity versus,

um, what we might call pre-modernity or the ancient world view, the ancient mindset. Um, and so

when we talk about and then chanted intellect or an enchanted world view,

part of that is seeing the world through the lens of a truly biblical world view that has been

obscured by modernity, right? And it's very mechanistic, um, scientific, reductionistic way of

explaining reality. And what Chesterton points out, um, again, this is the, the 32nd version, uh, is

that what are laws of science anyway, right? We believe that when we give a physical description

of something that we've described it in its totality, but a law of science is just an articulation

of a repeated occurrence. I mean, that's what it is. When we, when I ask the question,

when a Christian gets up and, uh, they slide their legs out of bed and they don't float into the ceiling,

right? Uh, you know, why? Why is that happening? Well, um, science says gravity. And then when

you say, well, what is gravity? Well, it's, uh, it's the attraction of objects of mass to one

another. And well, what does that mean, right? Eventually, right, you're going to get to the bottom

where the answer is something like it's magic, right? Um, what Chesterton points out is it's an

unwarranted inference to say that because something usually happens or even has always happened,

that it will continue to happen. And laws of science have no causal power. They're just

descriptions of how things have happened. And so he suggests that no, no, no, no, no, that's,

that's not what we see in scripture. Science is wonderful and the laws of science are beautiful

descriptions of God's creative handiwork. And so there's this wonderful passage. We would read in

my classroom, we would read, uh, the ethics of Elfland as part of my philosophy and apologetics class.

And, um, there's this wonderful passage where he says, why does the sun come up every day? It's

because God is up there going, oh, do it again, right? Uh, every day God is so enamored with how cool

the sun is that he goes, do it again, do it again. Um, so my favorite encapsulation of, uh,

uh, uh, guess of all this, I stole from a student, uh, we were reading the ethics of Elfland,

and I had them do reflections. And here's what he said. This was his, uh, their challenge was to

try to encapsulate in one sentence, okay, the chief take away from the text. And his answer was the

most reasonable response to reality is wonder at the magic and gratitude toward the magician.

Are you going to repeat that? Oh, oh, yeah. So, this is good. Yeah. So the most reasonable response

to reality is wonder at the magic and gratitude toward the magician.

So, um, there's this beautiful, um, another, another plug for a wonderful book for your readers.

If you guys have an encountered, um, winter, winter fire, it's a delightful, uh, Christmas and

Advent devotional by a guy named Ryan Whitaker Smith. It's a subtitle is Christmas with GK

Chesterton. Um, it is, it is delightful snag a copy. Um, but there's this beautiful passage that I

think encapsulates what he's getting at. Um, we have lost something, um, with the rise of modernity

and this mechanistic perspective, um, a loss of enchantment. And he gives this description, um,

of GK Chesterton, uh, you know, and it's this beautiful image of what the enchanted

intellect looks like. Um, he says, so, uh, so Chesterton exits this garden and turns the corner.

And the large man's cane is clinking along the cobblestones and he mutters under his breath

something about Christmas. And then he's momentarily stunned into silence by the image of a sparrow

on a tall barren tree's branch silhouetted against the darkening sky. Right? Okay.

I love that picture. Nothing is more mundane in England than a sparrow on a tree branch.

But the enchanted intellect is stunned into silence. When they observe what we think of as this

mundane phenomenon. So there's a real sense in which, um, I've kind of made it my life's quest

to be that person and to have this infectious contagion, um, of seeing the magic everywhere, um,

of seeing God's handiwork and creativity and everything. This is one of the most beautiful and

wonderful things about fantasy fiction. Um, as Chesterton said, the purpose of travel isn't to go to

a foreign country. It's to return to your homeland and experience it as a foreign country,

meaning that when you, when we walk away from the, the, the mere incidental creative things that

God has done, I mean trees didn't have to be green. Things didn't have to be attracted to objects

of mass. Um, things could float up instead of down, um, you know, there's such a multitude of creative

decisions that God has made and sustains in being himself. Um, you know, none, none of that is

necessary. And when we go into a fantasy world where things do float up and trees are purple,

part of the purpose of that is to bring us back to our own world and rekindle the wonder at what

God has done here, right, with his creative masterpiece. Um, but I could, again, I could, we can,

well, this is, this is fascinating. We can keep doing this forever. Um, this is great. Um,

we talked a lot about classical Christian education. Sure.

World view academy is not just for students that are receiving a certain kind of education,

right? So whether you're public schooled, you went there as a homeschool student, right?

Yes. It doesn't matter as long as you're between 13 and 18, right? What are some other,

kind of, I guess, like the typical profile of, of attendee at world view academy. What would you

say was really all over the place? It is, it is all over the place, right? I mean, we have,

um, you know, within the classical Christian renewal when students come, um, they're like,

ooh, this is familiar and good. And, uh, they go back to their classrooms, uh, those of us

who have taught in the classical Christian world, we've always had that parent come to us and go,

well, Johnny came home yesterday and he said this thing that I've been telling them for 10 years.

And then you said it. And suddenly it's, it's meaningful to them, right? We've all had that

conversation. World view does that, right? It takes in a different kind of package that impacts

the heart and mind in a different kind of way. Um, a lot of the same material that I, that I

classically trained student is receiving, reinforcing, igniting passion. Um, and then, you know,

it's got different emphases in terms of, uh, current cultural engagement. Um, but if you are,

um, we have a lot of homeschool students, we have public school students. Um, I mean, it,

it really is designed to meet a person where they're at and be able to draw them deeper,

depending on exactly where they are. Hence why, um, so every, every student is grouped into a small

group of like age and sex with their own small group leader so that they can have age appropriate

level of depth conversations. Uh, and there's a, the intentional structure to those conversations

when they happen. Um, uh, I should mention, because this sounds like students are just in class

from the entire week. There is a, there is free time as well. There is sports. Um, but even,

even those activities are being conducted intentionally. The students don't realize this,

but those activities become the examples that are later used to apply the principles of leadership

that students are learning. Um, so it's again, nothing, nothing is, is wasted. Um, but uh, yeah,

I mean, the profile really is very broad. Um, you know, I, I staffed with the ministry as a college

staffer. Um, uh, so 2006 and 2007 for the whole summers and then a smattering of fall camps here and

there. And so I got to, I got to experience the gambit of small groups. Um, and inevitably there

would be some kids in that small group who are classically trained and, you know, they were

taken the conversation deeper. There would be homeschool students, you know, engaging in the same

way and public school students that are going, wow, this is really interesting. Can explain some of

these terms to me. And then there was always one or two guys that were like, I'm here because my

mother made me, right, every time. Now, the, the best part, and this was what was so exciting.

At first, that was really discouraging to me as a young man. It's like, oh, great. I've got

these guys that don't want to be here by the end of camp. Um, so the amazing statistic and I haven't,

I haven't got an update on this. But when I was on college staff, our early bird registration

rate was in the, is it the upper 80% meaning that at the end of camp, over 80% of the students

were immediately asking their parents to sign them up again. And so inevitably, I'd have those two

guys that are there, mom made me at the end of camp. They're going, mom, we should, we should

probably do this again. Right. And then they're going out and mowing lawns so they can pay for it

themselves. Yeah. And they oftentimes become the, the best evangelists, right? Exactly. It's exactly

it. Yep. Absolutely. Love that. I mean, I've worked for a standardized test company. So

the number of students that take a test because their mom made them, it's quite high. But you know

what? There's still going to be exposed to truth, goodness and beauty and beautiful passages,

right? And yes, but that's absolutely what I mean, that's the, the mission of CLT,

dovetails so beautifully with all this because you are humanizing assessment. That's right.

I mean, yeah, but yeah, I'm sure we can go off on that tangent bit.

Well, my friend, this has been so delightful. I, I could talk to you for many more hours about,

about all of this, but for the sake of time. And we talked a little bit before we started recording

about having to pick one book or one text and you're already quoted so many. So I know it's

and it's difficult, but try to be disciplined. Andrew, is there, is there a specific book or text

that you can point to that that just had such a profound impact on your life with the exception

of course, the Bible. I'm assuming that would be your first bet. What would it be in and why?

Okay, so I thought quite a bit about this and I have to say there's two texts some debating

back and forth on. One is it's a, it's, so there's a book called The Weight of Glory. It's a collection

of CS Lewis's sermons and essays. And the sermon in there entitled The Weight of Glory. And then

there's another one called Transposition. Together, when you read them together, it's pretty amazing.

I actually proposed to my wife in the church that Lewis delivered that sermon in. So it's

another great story. That's pretty neat. It was amazing. But so that text The Weight of Glory

is huge. I reread it annually because I need that refreshment. But if I really, okay, so to not

cheat, if I really had to boil it down to the text that had the most profound impact on me and that

I still return to, it would be the third part of mere Christianity beyond personality.

It's actually the last couple of paragraphs of the book. And it's that Seaky first the kingdom

right and all these things will be added into you. It's that right communicated in Lewis's

inimitable style. He points out that if we pursue ourselves, right, if we pursue after ourselves,

we will in the long run only find death decay and despair. But if we pursue Christ,

we get Christ. And with him, everything else thrown in, sorry, I can't even quote it. It gets

to me. If we pursue Christ, we get Christ. And with him, everything else thrown in, that revolutionized

my thinking and my life and my heart. And grateful to brother Lewis for that. So that's my final

answer. It's the beyond personality third part of mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis. Wow. Thank you

so much for sharing that. Wow. What a way to end Andrew. Again, we're here with Andrew Morton,

Senior Fellow at World View Academy. Go check out the website worldview.org and whether you are

a student that is interested or if you want to get involved, maybe you want to volunteer, whatever

it might be, go check it out, reach out to CLT if you have any questions. We'll make sure we'll

connect you with Andrew. But really grateful for the excellent work that you're doing. I mean,

I think everyone listening today, just you're the embodiment of the kind of education that you're

now also passing on to the next generation. And that talk about Chesterton, right? It's just

really beautiful to see. I'm enchanted for sure after this conversation. And yeah, we're just

praying for you all and keep up the great work, Andrew. Thanks for joining today. Thank you so

and thank you for yeah, we're on the same mission, brother. So appreciate you. Thank you for the

opportunity and look forward to seeing your listeners at World View at a camp near near them.

Thanks for listening to this episode of Anchored. If you enjoyed it,

please be sure to leave a rating or review on your podcast platform of choice.

And remember to subscribe and share with your friends and colleagues. Thanks for joining us

and we'll see you next time.